Freedom in Christ

Today was a really odd day. I spent a couple of hours almost cripplingly depressed. All the changes going on in life, even good things like getting married, I think are catching up with me. However, the depression raised an interesting and spiritually valuable point.

Are we free to be weak before God and before others? Of course the "theological" answer is Yes. But on a very practical level, do we really understand what being "free to be weak" means? Its ugly. We don't like being ugly.

As Christians, as believers in Jesus, we really do not like actually wearing the marks of our fallen creaturliness. When we talk about our sins, we like to talk about our "good old days" sort of sins, when we used to get drunk with our buddies. Or we like to talk about our sins in a noble sort of faux-humility that gets others to nod and approve of us even in the midst of our supposed confessions. But to be a sinner is to be alone and gross. At our most real we are disgusting and unlovable. We are, as St. Augustine says, "bent in on ourselves."

Because grace is grace and salvation is salvation, our disgusting and unattractive selves do not become any more beautiful. Rather, grace and salvation strike at the root of the human problem by offering no real solution to our immediate lives. We are left to ourselves. We are left to ourselves to believe. Not meritorious belief. Not heroic belief. Pathetic belief. Belief that looks not at ourselves but at Him who redeemed us and has made us eternally right with God.

We look to Jesus and sigh, content that all is going to be set to rights. We also sigh because this truth does not make our lives one lick easier. The way that faith sets us free is not like that. We are set free to endure, not to get a free ticket out of our problems.